Anvil Front-End Data Recording Solution

Anvil is an “All-Digital” front-end solution to data recording.  Based on solid state SDRAM memory and a completely embedded hardware architecture, Anvil has been designed to optimally address the most critical stage of real time data recording: effective capture of sensor streams, ensuring there is no loss of valuable signal data.

Anvil’s embedded hardware architecture and large capacity of high throughput, dual access SDRAM memory nodes are optimally designed to capture sensor data, rate buffer and then transfer it to secondary hard disk drive media.  With its four full length, full height PCI slots, Anvil can accommodate a variety of sensor input I/O (A/D, Serial FPDP, fiber links) and storage output I/O (fibre channel, SCSI, SATA) to record data on traditional hard disk drive arrays in the form of RAIDs or JBODs (Just a Bunch of Disks).  Data can then be accessed by management workstation consoles for playback analysis, or server farms for off-line processing.  Alternatively, depending on the application’s bandwidth and storage requirements, workstations and servers can also access data directly from Anvil without relying on any intermediary hard disk drive storage resources.  

         

Applications:  Acquisition of real time sensor data for recording or signal analysis.

  • Intelligence and Surveillance: Radar, Signal Intelligence, Electro Optical /Infrared, Software Defined Radio

  • Semiconductor Manufacturing and Test Equipment

  • Medical Diagnostic and Test Equipment

  • Energy and Fuel exploration, Seismic Analysis, Telemetry, Real Time Simulators and various Digital Instrumentation

  • Video and Streaming Media Editing Facilities

Snapshot Recording Capabilities

Anvil is the industry’s first storage subsystem capable of properly addressing the technical challenges of “snapshot” data recording.  In such applications, valuable sensor data can burst at very high rates that exceed the sustained write transfer capabilities of traditional storage media such as hard disk drives, flash memory, or tape.  To effectively capture signal data utilizing one of these traditional storage medias, sensors must often be down throttled to reduced performance modes or data must be filtered at a higher degree of resolution than otherwise desired due to the inherent bandwidth limitations of the storage media.

Unlike other data recorders that are principally based on hard disk drive (HDD), flash, or tape technology, Anvil utilizes SDRAM memory not just for maximum performance, but for the most consistent, predictable performance.  Providing thirty-two sockets for industry standard SODIMM modules, Anvil can provide up to 64GB of solid state, SDRAM memory.  Each of the two memory arrays within Anvil can sustain data transfer rates of over 500 MB/s.  These independent memory nodes also support multiple concurrent DMA operations, so data can in effect be written into a single memory node while simultaneously being read out of that same memory node.

 

Notable Product Attributes:

  • Embedded, “All-Digital” architecture for high throughput, consistent performance absorbs the variable behavior inherent to hard disk drives while providing a deterministic platform for data transfers.

  • Enables the use of “Hierarchal Storage” where Anvil can support high sustained front-end throughput and i.) large density, low cost SATA hard disk drives can reliably be utilized for secondary storage where more costly SCSI or fibre channel drives would otherwise be required, and ii.) far fewer hard disk drives can be utilized to achieve the necessary bandwidth and storage requirements resulting in reduced cost and complexity.

  • First effective solution for bringing general purpose, widely utilized Linux filesystems to real time data recording.

  • Flexibility of four full height, full length PCI slots leveraging the computing industry’s most widely utilized bus and form factor for various I/O such as A/D, Serial FPDP, fibre channel, SATA, etc.

  • Native PowerPC and Gigabit Ethernet with optional support for x86 processor platforms (via PrPMC site).

Anvil Product Overview.pdf (detailed description and specifications)